Thursday, January 30, 2014

Once again, the hounds here have been asked to sample treats from chewy.com. This time I chose Nutro crunchy treats with real pomegranate, you know to try to get a little variety in their diet!

These crunchy treats are made with real pomegranates, contain 100% Natural ingredients, and are made with healthy whole grains, such as whole brown rice and oatmeal. But the best part, they are made in the USA! As dog lovers, we all know how important that it. These treats are on the smaller size so they would be great to use for training treats as well.

I have a couple of pups who tend to get an upset stomach around the witching hour of 3 a.m. Which got me to thinking, are they hungry? These guys eat around 5 a.m. and 5 p.m., so that kind of made sense. I will try to spare you all the gory details, but they just tend to spit up bile-looking stuff. So for the past couple of weeks I have been giving a treat just before bed time. I guess it worked, because no one has gotten sick lately.

Saturday, January 25, 2014

For years now, I have been following the work of Steve Uyehara. I have always wanted him to photograph one of my hounds. I guess you could say it's been on my "greyhound bucket list". After our plans were finalized for Dewey, I scheduled a shoot with Steve for the last session of the day on Friday. Well, as you can see from my last post about Dewey, the weather didn't cooperate at all. We rescheduled for Sunday. I had already made up my mind, weather be damned, we were getting those pictures!

It was so cold and windy on Sunday, but it wasn't raining! So we were on! I met Steve and told him this could be interesting because Sadie really didn't care for the beach. Of course, just like a child, she proved me wrong. Stepped onto the sand and she turned into a different dog!

I can't thank Steve enough for these memories. My Sadie has a heart condition and just turned 10 in November. I cherish every day with her and to say she is my heart dog is an understatement. If you would like to see all the photos from the shoot go HERE.

Saturday, January 11, 2014

Pictures were not plentiful this year at Dewey. I wound up taking my pictures with my phone, so I apologize for the quality of my photos.

I had an offer to ride along with Bec from Greytglass this year. I really wanted to take Sadie and it is such a long drive, that I took her up on her offer. We arrived at Bec's house on Tuesday morning to help her load up the truck with her vending goodies. I should have known when Sadie jumped in her recliner, that she would be stealing couches and beds wherever we went!

We hit rain about an hour out of Dewey. We had no idea that this is what we had in store for us the entire week. We stayed in a second floor apartment. I was told the view to the bay was great. This was taken from our balcony.

The girls from Midwest Greyhound Adoption were in the bottom level of the house. They were kind enough to feed us the entire week. On our first dinner appearance, Sadie walked in and went to the most comfy spot! Sadie also became known for stealing Dirk's dinner every night!

I was particularly smitten with one of the dogs in the house. His name is Dirk and he is one of the most gorgeous big black boys you will ever see. He was so sweet. I tried to sneak him out with us, but it's kind of hard to hide 95 pounds! I still can't believe Sadie stole his dinners.

Bec's constant companion is her whippet, Princess Arianna. Ari was the sweetest thing and she and Sadie got along great. The girls were both troopers as we drug them around with us everywhere in the rain. I tried to leave Sadie for a couple of hours and heard that she whined the entire time we were gone. I guess she didn't mind getting wet as long as she was with me.

One of the girls that stayed with us bought this nice blanket from Midwest and Sadie proceeded to steal it. I wound up buying us our own blanket to bring home since she liked it so much!

There was so much rain, I felt so bad for the vendors. We were trying to get to them and we wound up going back the next day after the water receded.

Finally on Saturday, we made it to the beach in Rehoboth. Sadie and I walked from the Fire Hall down to the beach. It was so windy, but dang it we were determined to see the ocean!

Sadie was less than thrilled with all the wind and the noise from the waves crashing.

On the way back to the Fire Hall, the most amazing thing happened. Well, I say amazing, but I am a crazy greyhound lady. I passed this car and saw on the windows a decal from Greyhound Rescue and Rehabilitation. The thought popped in my mind "is Freddy here?". Normally, I am a shy person, but when there are greyhounds involved, all that goes out the window. I walked up to the front of the Fire Hall and there was a lady taking pictures and I heard her say "FREDDY". I got in there and introduced myself and finally got my hands on Freddy.

For those of you on Facebook, you may or may not have heard Freddy's story. Freddy is a beautiful young brindle boy who got the worst of things in a turn out pen brawl. He went through many surgeries and spent a long time recuperating. Christine, shown in this picture, fostered Freddy. Christine also wound up adopting Freddy. I cried many a tear over this boy during his surgeries. It still amazes me that these hounds can touch my heart so.

Christine showed me pictures of Freddy's original wounds. I always knew he was special, but that boy had to have some serious will to live to pull through all this. Today, Freddy appears to be a young, healthy, beautiful brindle boy. His mom says he loves life and is a sweetie. Meeting Freddy was a definite bright spot in my trip.

Once back inside the Fire Hall, Sadie proceeded to go to the Greytglass booth and slip in behind Ari and fall fast asleep. Ari looks a little less than pleased.

Here is Sadie passed out on her own blankie from Midwest. This blanket is huge and super warm. Perfect for snuggling with on a cold Indiana night. If you can get the dogs off of it, that is!

Sadie is a well rounded girl and gets along with everyone. She and Ari were troopers on this trip and got along so good. Ari even tolerated Sadie using her as a pillow. It was a long trip, despite the weather, a good time was had by all.

Wednesday, January 1, 2014

In reflecting on 2013, I realized that I started this blog to keep a journal of my dogs and my foster dogs. I haven't really done such a great job. For 2014, I would like to try to do better.

This year my group, GPA Tri-State, celebrated ten years of finding homes for greyhounds. Our Greyt Fest was held on September 28th. Not only is this our biggest fundraiser, but being our 10th year celebration, we needed to make this one extra special.

Rae Photography, a young girl who is starting her photography business, came to take pictures. My dogs were first and they were still a bit wound up, so we didn't get too many good photos. This one is my favorite of Sadie and Bowser.

This is a cute one of Bowser showing off his slight roman nose.

This is Vivie, her racing name was Spectacular Girl. That she is too This girl has so much personality! You stop petting her and she paws at you to start again. Such a sweetie!

GPA Nashville was one of our vendors and they had these awesome hand knit hats. I have always wanted one, so Bowser is the lucky boy. He looks less than pleased!

Besides the ever popular vendors, we have half pot drawings, a silent auction for memorial baskets, head and tails game, luminaries, games for the hounds and food! We also have our royalty! King and Queen and Prince and Princess. Probably the most fun at our event is the live auction. It's always entertaining to watch people bid against each other for some very nice greyhound items. Our folks work hard all year gathering donations. This year, I won three things!!!

An original painting from Josie Therapy Dog! I have been wanting one of these for a very long time!

My next score was an original NellieDoodles! As soon as I saw this, I knew I had to have it. It captures Bowser's personality perfectly.

This year I was in charge of the memorial basket silent auction as well as the royalty. Each dog is eligible, as long as you haven't won in a previous year. King and Queen are 8 years and older. Prince and Princess cannot have had their 8th birthday yet. Upon entry, each dog gets one vote. The winner is just the luck of the draw.

The King and Queen received their crowns, tag collars with a charm and an awesome bed! I thought this picture was so sweet!

Prince and princess! Prince Ulrick was my foster previously, so that makes him extra special!

People are pretty creative when it comes to their Memorial Baskets. I donated three this year, one for each of my angels.

Our extra special treat for our attendees was Colleen Pelar. She has written a couple books on dog behavior. I also picked her up from the airport and got a chance to talk with her. Super nice lady and didn't mind at all when Bowser got sick in the car! Unfortunately, I didn't get to listen to her talk as I was busy tending to my other responsibilities.

All in all, 2013 Greyt Fest was a success. But then again, isn't any day spent with friends and greyhounds a good day?